The Athletic keeps growing .......

Maybe that is why he *is* rolling in cash. (I have no clue ... making a lame joke. ... I don't know anything about the site).

Getting back to the Athletic. ... I am not "rooting" for it to succeed. I am not rooting for it to fail, either. On balance, all things being equal, I want it to do well, because *good* local sports coverage is something I am interested in, and on top of it, they are hiring some talented people . ... many of them nice people for whom I want good things) who I'd love to see have the opportunity to do the thing they love for a viable business that gives them personal stability, and is well-run and demand drive and profitable. We'll all have to sit back and see how it goes for their sites. Right now, they are probably burning through cash, which is fine when you have just had a big capital raise. But if they have to keep borrowing, and it drags on that way, it will be a warning sign.

If there is one thing that makes me dubious, it is the venture capital model. There has been so much stupid money chasing every idea because of a low-interest-rate / bubble environment that has built to a crescendo over the last decade, that there is no doubt in my mind that a lot of that money (which was misallocated capital spurred on by skewed incentives, same way the housing bubble came about) chased things (at higher and higher values, until it got to ridiculous territory), and it is ultimately going to be lost money. We have had a lot of ideas that would have never attracted capital in an environment not being price administered to create skewed risk profiles. And we have had some ideas that could have been viable, but availed themselves to a frenzy, in which the company's values got run up to levels that will never be able to be supported by the actual businesses in the long run. Think Uber.

All of that is why I am generally more interested (impressed?) by companies that establish value quickly and grow (often slowly) on the actual cash flow they are able to generate once they get the business off the ground, rather than going out and raising capital. Those businesses have to prove themselves along the way.

I don't know enough about the Athletic to comment either way. I do know that is the environment -- capital is flowing and there has been a bit of a frenzy, because the cost of borrowing has been suppressed for so long to be so cheap. So naturally I am wondering if the Athletic was being way overvalued in that last round of funding. It doesn't mean that is the case, and that those investors aren't really getting a bargain given a killer business plan. But ultimately, results will bear that out. By pointing that out, I am certainly not rooting against them, though. I am actually really interested as an outsider. It tangentially touches a type of business I used to be fascinated by and used to follow more closely.